adapters

To keep my small business network running, I've always tried to reduce costs where possible. Unfortunately, when it comes to network cards, using the lowest possible priced Ethernet card can be false economy.

The Netgear FA311 is one of the only cards I've come across where oddball compatibility issues don't arise. With others, there's always an issue or two, however minor they may be. A D-Link card that prevents a home automation package from working. A Linksys card that conflicts with an online streaming video technology. I could go on. The Netgear costs just a few dollars more than these others, but is still well under the price of brands such as 3Com in most cases.

For me, on all the machines I've tried, the FA311 installs quickly and easily, and works marvelously.

I have only one caution: Windows 2000 users should download and have ready the latest drivers from the Netgear web site. Across two FA311 purchases, the drivers delivered on the packaged floppy had various problems (e.g., major packet loss). I'm used to doing that as a matter of course for the majority of driver-dependent computer goodies, so I didn't find it to be a hassle in this case.

I bought this card for ... after my previous RealTek card ... out...The package had a 'Supports Windows XP' sticker on it, but I was still happily surprised to see XP find it and welcome it without so much as asking for either the included driver disk or the XP disk. I'm on a dual-boot system with 98, and of course 98 was fine with it too - although I did have to go through the 'search for the best driver' rigmarole and use both the driver diskette and the 98 disk to get it going.

Anyway, the card's looking good so far. I'd give it 5 stars, but I've only had it a day and, of course, Things Could Come Up.

First, let me say that I'm a loyal Netgear customer - I love their wired and wireless products and I usually don't even want to consider purchasing any other brand. Which is all the more reason why it pains me to say that FA311 is a really bad piece of hardware. When running many types of online software (games, P2P, etc.) FA311 will cause your PC to crash (you've been warned!) Some experts have attributed the problem to FA311 Win XP driver; however, Netgear refuses to acknowlege this and has no updates available as of this writing. And although you can install fixed 3rd party drivers for this card, I'd recommend to play it safe and avoid FA311 altogether!